ROANOKE TIMES
Copyright (c) 1996, Roanoke Times
DATE: Friday, March 29, 1996 TAG: 9603290094
SECTION: NATIONAL/INTERNATIONAL PAGE: A-4 EDITION: METRO
DATELINE: WASHINGTON
SOURCE: The Washington Post|
The Senate gave final approval Thursday to a $47 billion farm bill that abandons Depression-era subsidy programs in favor of a system of fixed but declining payments over seven years.
Final passage ended months of often bitter debate between Republicans eager to end farmers' reliance on complicated programs that often restrict the supply of basic foodstuffs and Democrats worried that the new scheme would fatally damage the subsidies that have cushioned farmers during hard times since the 1930s.
The Senate approved the joint Senate-House version of the Federal Agriculture Improvement and Reform Act, 74-26. The House planned to approve the bill later.
Sen. Dick Lugar, R-Ind., chairman of the Agriculture, Nutrition and Forestry Committee, described the bill as ``the most historic change in American agriculture policy since the 1930s'' and predicted ``net income for American farmers will increase, generating dynamic economic renewal in rural America.''
President Clinton has said he will sign the bill, virtually at the moment spring planting begins.
Central to the new bill, to spend about $47 billion over seven years, are ``transition payments'' - fixed but declining sums paid to farmers of major crops such as corn, wheat, cotton and rice.
Restrictions on what crops farmers may plant and how much they may grow are all but abandoned in hopes U.S. agriculture may be better able to take advantage of growing export markets for basic commodities.
Despite general praise for the freedoms given to farmers, the bill's opponents charged it damaged farmers' traditional ``safety net,'' that it pays them regardless of commodity prices. The new system, said Sen. Tom Harkin, D-Iowa, ``sets up a farm program that makes farm payments that have no relation to price. No matter what the market says, you're going to get a check. Most farmers I know don't like to farm like that.''
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